The Arkansaw traveler., 1887-12-17
Con,ptIed for The Ark0nsos TrGueLer. SCIENTIFIC MISCELLANY

NhOAAAoSo 10 tAO ACNCub BY AbAlC6lb O1 glucose, or grape-sugar, by Drs. Fischer and Tafel, at the University of Wurzburg. A remarkable attribute of the artificial product is that, unlike other sugars of the same composition, it will not rotate beam of polarized light.
 THE COLDEsT SPoT YET FOUND The Russian weather observing sys- tenn is the most extensive on the globe. and embraces remarkable cli- matic contrasts. It has two principal observatories and 255 subordinate sta- tions, and it's latest report gives rain- fall observations for $50 localities. Many of the stations have lately been added, and one of these, Werchojansk in Siberia, is now regarded as the coldest known point on earth.
 NATURAL SHADES OF SILK.-Dur- ing the past two seasons, Mr. E. B. Poulton has made observations which prove that the silk of at least three species of English moths is greatly af- fected in color by environment at the time of spinning. The cocoons were dark brown when the larvse had been placed in black bag or among green leaves, and white when they had been freely exposed to light in the imme- diate neighborhood of white surfaces.
 A Nook OF UNCLE SAM's CURIOSITY SHoP.-The National Museum at Washington contains set of the pharmacopoeias of all nations, fur nishing complete list of the worlds standard medicines. From these a universal pharmacopoeia is to be com- piled. The department of Materia Medica in the museum illustrates the worlds past and present medical practice, and is designed to include every kind of raw material, prepara- tion, instrument and appliance ever used in medicine, surgery or hygiene. Several thousand specimens have thus far been collected, showing the mate- rials and processes of modern phar- macy, together with such curiosities as alligator oil, frogs, toads, tortoise shells, ambergris, cod-livers, pearls, snails, snakes and other odd sub stances to which healing powers have been attributed.
 A BIRD's-EYE VIEw.-Imagining an observer to be conveniently sta- tioned in space and scrutinizing the earth as it turns on it's axis, we may suppose him to be struck, as Sir Will liam Dawson remarks, with the fact that water covers seleven-sixteenths of the surface, and that the land is so un- equally distributed that from one point of view he would see a hemi- sphere almost exclusively oceanic, nearly the whole of the dry land being in the opposite hemisphere. "He might observe that the great oceanic area of the Pacific and Ant arctic oceans is dotted with islands like a shallow pool with stones rising above its surface-as if its general depth were small ill comparison with its area. He might also notice that mass or belt of land surrounds each pole, and that the northern ring sends off to southward three vast tongues of land and of mountain chains, termin- ating respectively in South America, South Africa and Australia, toward which teebler and insular processes are given off by the Antarctic conti- mental mass. This, as some geogra- phers have observed, gives rudely three ribbed aspect to the earth, though two of the three ribs are crowded together and form the Europe Asian mass or double conti- nent, while the third is isolated in the single continent of America. He might also observe that the northern girdle is cut across, SO that the At lantic opens by wide space into the Arctic Sea, while the Pacific is con- tracted toward the north, but conflu- ent with the Antarctic Ocean. The Atlantic is also relatively deeper and less cumbered with islands than the Pacific, which has the higher ridges near its shores, constituting what some visitors to the Pacific coast of America have not inaptly called the back of the world,' while the wider slopes face the narrower ocean, into which, for this reason, the greater part of the lands drainage is poured." The Pacific and Atlantic, though both depressions or flattenings of the earth, are different in age, character and con- ditions; and the Atlantic, though the smaller, is, in some respects, geo. logically the more important. With a knowledge of the rock formations, our imaginary observer would notice that those bordering the north At lantic are of great age, while many of the Pacific ranges are comparatively new, from which he might be led to believe that the Atlantic, though comparatively narrow, is an older feature of the earth's surface, the Pa cific belonging to much more modern times.